Title: Top 10 Wrestling Finishers
Date: March 2, 2009
Original Source: The On Deck Circle
Synopsis: This was a very short and random look at my favorite finishing moves in wrestling. No, I don’t know why, either.
If you want to make it big as a professional wrestler, there are a few criteria you have no choice but to meet. You almost always have to have a great body. You usually have to bring something unique, whether that be in look or character. In most cases, you have to be able to cut a decent promo. A catch phrase goes a hell of a long way, too, if you smell what I’m cooking.
These are the keys to making it to the top – look, uniqueness, mic skills, and marketability.
But if you’re missing some of these qualities, or if you have them and still aren’t everything you want to be as a wrestler, I’ve got two words for you:
Finishing. Move.
A finishing move can make or break your career. It has to be unique (or at least performed in a unique way), it needs a catchy name, and it has to be usable in the flow of a match. That is, it has to be fairly easy to pull off, it has to be able to come out of a number of situations, and it has to be convincing enough to end a match and make it meaningful when someone kicks out.
With all of that said, I give you the 10 best finishing moves in wrestling today.
The criteria required the wrestlers to be active on either the WWE or TNA roster page. I know this excludes retired finishers (like the Stone Cold Stunner and Rock Bottom), and finishers that are probably sick but haven’t made it to WWE/TNA, but it was just way easier to do it this way instead of researching every finisher ever (read: I put very little effort into this list).
Honorable Mention: Brent Spurgeon’s Flying Corkscrew MoopyBuster, Dave Power’s Quack Attach, John Heymans’ HoratioDriver
Legitimate Honorable Mention: Undertaker’s Tombstone Piledriver, Mike Knox’s Knox Out, Carlito’s Backcracker, MVP’s Drive By, John Morrison’s Moonlight Drive, Christian’s UnPrettier, Jeff Hardy’s Swanton, The Brian Kendrick’s The Kendrick, Batista’s Batista Bomb.
10. Triple H – The Pedigree
9. CM Punk – Go To Sleep
8. Abyss – Black Hole Slam
7. AJ Styles – Styles Clash
6. Cody Rhodes – Cross Rhodes
5. Homicide – Gringo Killer
4. Evan Bourne – Shooting Star Press
3. Shawn Michaels – Sweet Chin Music
2. Petey Williams – Canadian Destroyer
1. Randy Orton – RKO
Blake Murphy Sports Writing 